Serving those who serve us: How an Arizona child care center meets the needs of first responders

TUSCON, Arizona — The energy in Jordan Menefee’s preschool class was palpable.

A gaggle of 4- and 5-year-olds just finished lunch. Menefee turned on a soothing instrumental track, the kind more typical of a spa than a child care center, to set the scene for naptime.

The suspended chords of an electric piano were just audible above the din of tiny voices. But Menefee wasn’t phased by the overlapping chatter and steady stream of questions.  

Dressed in heart-shaped tortoise glasses and a cobalt blue t-shirt with the word “kindness” in white block letters, she deployed a gentle, sing-song voice and instructed students to grab a picture book and wait on their mats. 

It’s all part of a familiar routine that children and their parents have come to expect.

The Erik Hite Child Development Center is owned and operated by the Erik Hite Foundation, a non-profit organization in Tucson, Arizona. It exclusively serves children of Tucson-area first responders and their families.

The center was designed around one core idea: If first responders don’t work 9-to-5, their child care can’t, either.

‘We become that support system’

Nohemy Hite launched the Erik Hite Foundation in 2009 in memory of her husband, a Tucson Police Department officer shot and killed in the line of duty.

Offering a child care center with extended hours was one of her top priorities from the beginning.

“There’s a lot of military and border patrol families and so they are here by themselves,” Hite said. “They have no support system. So we become that support system for them.”

At the Erik Hite CDC, the center opens before sunrise and offers extended and drop-in hours in the evening. 

Most children who attend the Erik Hite CDC arrive somewhere between 6 and 6:30 a.m. and leave about 12 hours later, director Faye Collins said.

But when a parent is held over on a call or delayed at the end of a shift, staff adjusts. Families aren’t penalized for late pickups tied to the realities of the job.

While the center isn’t open 24 hours a day, staff work overtime to meet the needs of families who need to drop off their children earlier or pick them up later in the evening. 

“Policing is a 24/7 operation and usually, standard childcare is an 8 to 5,” said Tucson Police Chief Monica Prieto, who also serves on the foundation’s board. “There are challenges trying to find child care that is flexible, also trustworthy and affordable.”

Child care gets even more complicated when first responders are married or coparent with other shift workers like medical professionals or fellow first responders — something Collins said is pretty common among families at the center.

“We all know that child care takes a village as it is,” Menefee said. “When you’re a first responder, your village needs to be a little different from other people’s villages.”

Center based care built for flexibility

In order to adjust to the unpredictable schedules of the center’s families, staff at the Erik Hite CDC have to be willing to extend their own working hours when duty calls.

“They need to be available if we call them at midnight, Saturday morning, 5 o’clock in the morning,” Hite said.

“If a person is interviewing and she or he doesn’t have that kind of a schedule, then we stop that interview right away.” 

The expectation is clear: Just as first responders are called in when emergencies happen, the people caring for their children need to be able to respond, too.

Having that mindset and that understanding — we’re serving those who serve us — is really big during the hiring process.

Faye collins, director of the erik Hite child development center

That mentality became all the more paramount during the COVID-19 pandemic. When nearly every child care center in Tucson closed, the Erik Hite CDC continued operating.

“We have to come in and make sure that we cover that for those families because they don’t have any other options,” Collins said. “Having that mindset and that understanding — we’re serving those who serve us — is really big during the hiring process.”

Collins said those expectations can make hiring more difficult — but they also shape the culture of the center.

“I’m very selective during the interview process,” she said. “I have specific questions that I go off to make sure that these are the right fit for us.”

Staff at Erik Hite say they’re willing to go the extra mile because of the sense of community between themselves and the families they serve.

“We understand the struggles that they face,” Collins said. “It’s like a partnership. They take care of us and we take care of them.”

A model that supports both families and staff

While the expectations for staff are high, the center is also structured to support them.

The Erik Hite Foundation provides benefits that are uncommon in the child care industry, including health insurance, overtime pay and paid time off. An analysis by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation found employee salaries were about 15-percent higher than the local average.

Collins said the center is able to offer low rates and good benefits because the center is “heavily subsidized” by the foundation.

“The foundation team works so hard to get us that funding so that we can provide better care for our staff, better care for children,” she said.

While Erik Hite’s unique structure may limit the field of candidates, Collins said once she hires staff, that support makes it easier to step in when flexibility is needed.

“I’m always willing to jump in and cover a shift if I need to,” she added. “I know what it’s like being in a classroom or having to deal with those kinds of things.”

The foundation’s funding also allows the center to keep costs lower for families — staff estimate rates are about 30-percent below the local average.

Those rates address an important paradox for many families — child care is expensive, but people tend to have children earlier in their career, when their earning potential is at its lowest.

“I think there’s a misconception that police officers make a lot of money,” Hite said. “Commanders and up, I will not argue about that. But the rookies — it’s hard to make ends meet.

“It’s not just police officers,” she added. “Firefighters and 911 operators, it’s the same way.”

The center also emphasizes security for parental peace of mind.

While it’s common for child care centers to have locked doors, security cameras and sign-in procedures, the Erik Hite CDC takes it a step further. There’s no outside signage and the center’s address isn’t publicly listed. Parents are strictly forbidden from picking their child up while in uniform.  

Prieto said those precautions help parents feel more confident and allow them to focus on the job at hand.

“Unfortunately, we see a lot of things that happen to kids and so we kind of get a little bit jaded in who we want to watch our kids,” Prieto said. “We want someone that we can trust and where we can leave our children and they’re going to be safe.”